[00:00:00] Welcome to Pilates Students' Manual, everything you want to know about Pilates in one place. I'm Olivia, and I'll be your host. Jump in the conversation on Instagram @pilatesstudentsmanual. And be sure to subscribe for updates on new episodes. Let's learn something new together.

Hello, hello everybody. Welcome back. We've got some fun things to talk about today. Namely, can you do Pilates while you are pregnant? The answer to that is yes. So if that was all you were looking for, look no further. Yes, you can do Pilates while you're pregnant, but I will qualify that it will [00:01:00] likely look a little bit different than the Pilates that you're doing right now if you are not pregnant. And let's talk a little bit about what that means. 

So I'll be talking about it here from the student perspective, as a student who is taking classes while they are pregnant. If you're really interested into the why behind- I'm going to be going over the no-no list. And also why Pilates is great for you. If you're interested in a little bit more of an in-depth look at it, I did an episode on Pilates Teachers' Manual. That's going to be, I mean, a little bit more jargony, but just a little bit more in depth. So if you desire to learn more, head over to Pilates Teachers' Manual, and there's an episode for Pilates and Pregnant Clients. Some of it will apply, again, as teachers, but there's just more information there for you should you be seeking that. 

Also a disclaimer, I have never been pregnant, so I've never done Pilates while I was pregnant, but I am going to be [00:02:00] sharing with you what I know from working with pregnant clients and taking trainings, working with prenatal and postpartum Pilates. 

What I do know is that all bodies are different and all pregnant bodies are different. And as a result, group classes are not ideal. Mat classes are really not ideal. Equipment classes are doable, but if you come to a group class and you are pregnant, what the teacher is going to do is try to line for line, change the exercises for you so that you're still following the flow of the class.

What that means is if something is happening, like Swan, where you're lying on your stomach, obviously that's a no, no in pregnancy. So they might have you do something like Swan, but maybe on another piece of equipment or maybe a filler exercise, like bird dog, depending on where you are in your pregnancy.

And so the class isn't going to be for you, the class is going to be for the group. And as a pregnant [00:03:00] person, you're either going to have to sit out exercises or modify the exercises usually in a less challenging way, because it's not just for your body. It's definitely better than not doing Pilates at all or not moving at all, but it's not for you. t's a general group class. 

Mat Pilates, especially is not for pregnant bodies. If you look at all the heavy ab work that's happening in mat Pilates, if you look at the exercises that are being done supine. Supine is not a great body position to be in, right? Where you're lying on your back for a long time. Just mat Pilates is not designed for a pregnant body. So you're going to be missing out on a lot of the benefits of Pilates if you do go to a mat Pilates class, that's just a general class instead of like a prenatal Pilates class. 

Prenatal Pilates, in my opinion, should be about getting your body moving and about feeling good in your body. And that's why private classes are really going to be a better [00:04:00] fit. If there isn't, again like a specific prenatal class. 

Just a heads up about prenatal classes. The reason why a bunch of studios don't offer them is because you're only pregnant for a short amount of time. So maybe they might offer it seasonally, or, you know, if there's five or six people who are pregnant at the same time, they can offer that class. But once you're not pregnant and you've moved past postpartum workout and you're back to working regularly, you may not be in that class anymore. So that's why there aren't more prenatal classes.

 So just to reiterate private sessions are really going to be a class that's tailored to you, what your body can, can and should do. And also avoiding the things that you shouldn't do. 

Ideally, you start doing Pilates, as a group class experience or as private, before you're pregnant, because it's good to have an understanding both of Pilates and of your body before you get pregnant because your body is obviously going to change while you are pregnant. Having that self knowledge and that understanding of your [00:05:00] body and the, the way that it moves in the way that it likes to move and the way that, so it's like natural range of movement. It's just good to have that before it changes. You have a baseline to go from if you start doing Pilates before you're pregnant.

If you have never done Pilates before and you are pregnant and you would like to do Pilates, definitely do privates. I would say that that is really the way to go, because you want an experienced instructor who is able to guide you through it. 

The patterns that you have in your body, the holding patterns, your postural patterns, your compensation patterns, all of those things will be exacerbated when you gain weight and when your body is sort of changing through pregnancy. It's difficult to adapt to the changes if you don't know where you were starting from. So really important if you've never done Pilates before to probably start with private sessions, if you're pregnant. 

So having that baseline knowledge of what your body does and doesn't do before you're pregnant is important because some of the [00:06:00] no nos around pregnancy have to do with avoiding extreme range of movement.

And it's difficult to know what an extreme range of motion in your body is because A) every body is different. And B) what's extreme really depends on you and where you were starting from. So you're getting more flexible as you are progressing in your pregnancy because your body is preparing for labor and you need to have a very flexible pelvic floor to deliver a child.

But that flexibility is not limited to your pelvic floor. You will be more flexible everywhere. You'll be more flexible in your hamstrings. You'll be more flexible in your shoulders. So things like extreme stretching is not going to be great because your body might be able to accommodate it when you are more flexible, but it won't be supported. I usually recommend clients only go for maybe a 70% of their range of movement when they're doing stretching. Stretching itself is fine, but if you're constantly chasing becoming more flexible, that [00:07:00] is not ideal while you're pregnant. 

Also because you're getting more flexible. Another no no is extreme adduction, or inner thigh contraction, that hugging to the midline because your pelvris is multiple bones, actually. It's not just one bone. There are little fusions around. And one of the fusions in the center of your pelvis right at your pubic bone is called the pubic symphysis. And that is a piece of cartilage that is like attaching the two sides of your pelvis together. And that is also getting more flexible. So if you're doing these really extreme inner thigh crushing, it's easy to dislocate that pubic symphysis. 

And I don't say that to scare you. It's just, it's a piece of cartilage and as it's more flexible, you can dislocate it and then you have to be on bed rest for the rest of your pregnancy. And that is super lame. Let's avoid that. 

Also because you're more flexible, something else to avoid is that extreme ab work, things like chest lifts, like series of five is not ideal to do while you're pregnant, your abs series. And that's because your [00:08:00] linea alba is also getting more flexible. 

Your linea alba is the vertical piece of connective tissue that runs right down the middle of your six pack, so your rectus abdominis muscle. And regardless of whether or not you have a visible six pack that you can see your muscles still looks like that under your tissue. And that little piece of connective tissue is also getting more flexible and it's easier to stretch out either leading up to birth or after birth. And you can end up with something called a rectus diastasis, which means that that one or two finger space between your abdominals can get stretched out.

And then things like your organs can say hello, which is not what we want, right? We want to keep our abdominal wall as a wall. Good news is if that happened, regardless of whether it was intense abdominal work, sometimes it can also happen if you have a very large baby or you're carrying twins because you know, it's getting stretched out, right? Everything's getting stretched out to accommodate. Pilates can also reverse that, but we don't want to cause that through doing that [00:09:00] intense abdominal work. 

Some of the no nos are related to body position. Supine work, where you're lying on your back is not great after your first trimester, because it can cut off blood flow. Your baby, inside your uterus, when you're lying flat on your back can apply pressure to what's called your abdominal aorta, which is a massive artery that pretty much gets blood to your lower body. We would not like to cut off circulation to our lower body. So we want to make sure that there isn't any constriction or pressure on that abdominal aorta.

Lying on your stomach, anything prone is also not great. It may be okay in the first trimester technically, but it can also make you feel nauseous. And your body will tell you both in that supine work in that prone work, whether or not that's a good idea for your body. So definitely listening to your body is important as well.

Also inverting is on the no no list. Any time your hips are higher than your heart, we want to avoid. So even for things like bridging, it's technically an inversion, right? Your hips are higher than [00:10:00] your heart when you do a bridge on the reformer or on the mat. 

And, of course, for all of these no nos, there are ways to you avoid it. Like if you're doing supine work, you might use a wedge to prop yourself up. If you're doing prone work, there isn't really like an exact, Oh, you can like do less prone work, but you can do a lot of the extension work that we often do in prone while you're standing, or while you're in a different body position.

Inversions are pretty much just a no no, which is lame. I do love inversions and you'll be able to invert again. But one of the things, while you're pregnant, you're at a higher risk for an air embolism where air can enter your bloodstream through your uterus, through your placenta. Let's avoid those and not invert.

Coming up after the break, I'm going to share why Pilates is excellent for pregnant bodies and why you should really consider doing Pilates while you're pregnant.

Hey, there. Enjoying the episode? Me too. You should definitely subscribe so you get [00:11:00] notifications about new episodes. And if you love it, maybe leave me a review. That would be awesome. Thanks for sharing the Pilates love. Now back to the show.

We've gotten all of the no nos out of the way. I know it's like a laundry list of things that you shouldn't do, but they are good to keep in mind. Ideally, Pilates teacher we'll go over them with you, especially if you're in a private, but they're also just good to know that these are like not great things for my body.

We get to move on to the more fun bit now, which is why Pilates is awesome, which is always the more fun bit, but specifically why it's awesome for pregnant bodies. 

Pilates promotes excellent breathing habits. When you are pregnant, your abdominal area is expanding and your growing uterus, that growing child, is really not allowing your diaphragm- which is a muscle that's [00:12:00] at the base of your rib cage that drops towards your belly when you inhale and lifts towards your heart, when you exhale. There's not as much room for that diaphragm muscle to drop down. But one of the breathing habits that we focus on in Pilates is that postio-lateral breathing where you're breathing deeply and filling, not just the up and down bit of your body, but also the sides and back bit of your body.

So we're focusing on really expanding the rib cage three-dimensionally, which will make breathing a lot easier for you because you have room to breathe there. You may not have room to breathe just by dropping that diaphragm to its maximum drop. 

Pilates also promotes circulation. While you're pregnant your blood flow increases. You have more blood in your body and you're circulating it a lot, right? Cause you're constantly refreshing the blood to your little infant person. Things like your feet swelling or your ankles swelling or varicose veins are all things that happen where the blood is pooling at parts of your body.

Pilates [00:13:00] promotes circulation and gets you moving mindfully. And also through that deep breathing is really helping that circulation so that you won't feel ideally as swollen and it can really help with that circulation. 

Pilates also creates body awareness. And that body awareness is not just about strengthening and contracting, tightening muscles. It's also about relaxing muscles that don't need to be working. So we all have patterns in our body where we're holding tension unnecessarily. A lot of times it happens in the shoulders. For me, I like to tense my left piriformis. That's just like a fun fact about me. 

So we get to identify those holding patterns in our body, and then begin to release some of that tension. That's going to be really important in labor where you are delivering your child, but also just in your life, not holding onto that unnecessary tightness and really beginning to let it go. 

Pilates is a form of corrective exercise. It's [00:14:00] helping to correct postural inbalances, the shifts in your weight, and the way that your spine is accommodating your pregnancy. 

Your body changes when you're pregnant and part of that weight gain is going to shift the way your spine curves. Pilates helps bring you back to center, back to neutral. So muscles like your calves and hamstrings aren't working over time as your center of gravity sort of shifts forward and your spine recalibrates to that shift. 

Same thing with your neck and your low back aching. Your head might shift forward to counterbalance the excessive curve that may occur in your low back because you're carrying a child. Pilates has your back. It helps bring you back to a more neutral curve. Of course, it's going to change slightly. We're not going to eradicate the changes, but we can bring you back towards center and back in towards neutral.

For swollen feet or feet that feel like they're growing or widening during pregnancy, there's a Pilates for that. As you gain weight, [00:15:00] your arches can collapse if they're weak and that creates that kind of spreading out, that widening of your foot. That's totally reversible though. Pilates can help, especially in terms of toning the muscles of your arch and really giving you that arch back, and narrowing the feet by creating that lift at your arch.

Pilates is also exceptional for pelvic floor health. And it's a tricky one. Pelvic floor is a really subtle work that we can do in Pilates. We don't do it all the time in group classes, but in privates you can definitely dive into it. Keeping a strong pelvic floor helps with urinary incontinence. So if you find that you pee a little when you laugh or when you sneeze or just like as you're pregnant or after you've delivered your child, that that incontinence persists, Pilates can help tone those pelvic floor muscles and give them that lift that they naturally have as they're lifting our organs kind of off of our pelvis.

So if your pelvic floor [00:16:00] muscles are too relaxed and that urinary incontinence is happening, we can create that lift and that strengthening through Pilates. We can also relax that pelvic floor muscle, if it is too tight in your pelvic floor. Pilates can also assist usually through deep breathing exercises, through lots of mental connection to those pelvic floor muscles moving really slowly, we can help relax that muscle as well. So whatever's going on with your pelvic floor, pilates can help. 

Every time I talk about Pilates, whether it's for pregnant bodies or for athletes, or for any reason at all, I'm just constantly astounded, impressed, and thrilled that I get to work with bodies of all kinds in all stages of life, in all adventures that can be had.

Because Pilates really exists for everyone. It's not for just dancers. It's not for, you know, just older people. There really is a way to adapt Pilates to meet [00:17:00] any body's needs. So if you are pregnant and you're not sure if you should do Pilates or you've done Pilates before, but now you're pregnant and you're not sure if you should, or what you might be getting into, just know that Pilates is there for you. 

And there are teachers who are trained to work with you through your specific stuff. Whether it's doing additional workshops and additional training or personal experience that you've been pregnant and you're also a Pilates teacher, that there are people out there to help.

I hope that that convinced you that Pilates is A) amazing and B) specifically amazing for pregnant friends. I hope you have a great week and I'll talk to you soon.

Thanks for stopping by for today's episode of Pilates Students' Manual. Subscribe to follow the podcast and join the community of Pilates lovers on Instagram @pilatesstudentsmanual. You can reach out to me there with questions, [00:18:00] comments, or feedback, or send me an email at pilatesstudentsmanual@oliviabioni.com.

If you learned something new today, share this episode and the Pilates love. The adventure continues. Until next time.